We rest on Thee, our shield and our defender!
We go not forth alone against the foe;
Strong in Thy strength, safe in Thy keeping tender,
We rest on Thee, and in Thy name we go.
We go in faith, our own great weakness feeling,
And needing more each day Thy grace to know:
Yet from our hearts a song of triumph pealing,
We rest on Thee, and in Thy name we go.
Edith G. Cherry (1872–1897)
Today is ‘All Saints Day’ a time for remembering those who have shown us what it means to be a Christian. In my article last Wednesday, I suggested that you read Hebrews ch.11 – a chapter which lists women and men who lived lives of faith. Now read what the writer of this letter goes on to say after listing these heroes:
Hebrews 12: 1-3
Each of us have known Jesus as our Saviour and Lord for different amounts of time. Some can look back over many decades of trying to live a life which glorifies God while others can only look back a few years, but I’m guessing that each of us are challenged by this bible reading as it raises 3 questions:
How well are we doing at throwing off the sin that so easily entangles?
How well are we doing at persevering in our relationship with God?
How well are we doing at keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus?
The answer to all 3 questions is probably - not as well as we hoped we would when at our baptism we declared Jesus to be our Saviour and Lord, but hopefully we can see some progress. Hopefully we can see that we have moved forward in our relationship with God.
The writer of Hebrews likens living the Christian life to running a race – not a short quick sprint – but a marathon. When we meet someone who has run one of these long-distance runs, we don’t say – ‘did you win?’ We might ask – ‘did you finish?’ and we’d perhaps ask – ‘were you pleased with your time?’ ‘Were you pleased with the race you ran?’
And that is the question for us to consider this morning ‘are you pleased with how you are progressing at living out your life to glory of God?’
When we watch on Tv a marathon, those who are wearing fancy-dress are often highlighted. While they might amuse us, we know that the person is not going to achieve their best while dressed like that and the writer of this letter to the Hebrews challenges us to recognise and throw off everything that hinders us from living a life that honours and glorifies God.
This phrase covers more than what is wrong – what is sinful. It also includes those things that don’t stop other Christians from running their best race but do hinder us and that is perhaps more difficult for us to throw off than sin. There are lots of neutral areas of life - not the obvious hinderance of sin – but area of life which don’t affect others but affect us - perhaps watching TV programmes that you know others in church watch but they cause you to lose your focus on Jesus.
The challenge is bigger than not doing what every knows to be sinful, it is also looking at what hinder us, personally, in our desire to live lives which glorify God. Recognising what hinders and entangles us and then to throw it off - and putting other things in its place which will be of more help in keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus. This may involve us not doing things which the majority of the world does, and maybe even not doing things that the majority of people at church do, and perhaps even not doing things which the rest of our family do.
But perhaps what is even more difficult to for us, is when we feel that to keep our eyes fixed on Jesus we need to do things which the majority of people find strange, perhaps do things which the rest of our family don’t do or do things which many people at church don’t do so that we can preserve in the race marked out for us.
If you were training to run a marathon you would be behaving differently to the majority of people – you would not only be throwing off activities and habits which hinders and entangle you, but you would also persevere at the things which are going to help you. A serious runner would look at every aspect of their life and see how they can do better at achieving their aim – the obvious one which came to mind was – the runner getting up earlier than everyone else so they can go out and train. Transfer that into the context of aiming of live a life of faith and the challenge becomes getting up a bit earlier so as to start the day fixing our eyes on Jesus with a bible reading and prayer.
If we decide to pick up these challenges – throwing off things which hinder and entangle us and put in their place new helpful things to help us persevere in fixing our eyes on Jesus, we will find that our faith will grow stronger and our lives will be a witness to other Christians, helping them to throw off what hinders them in their lives and helping them to fix their eyes on Jesus. Our lives will also become a witness to those who don’t know Jesus as Saviour and Lord, enabling them to see the glory of God.
Use the words to this song to help you to pray:
Turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in his wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
in the light of his glory and grace
Helen H Lemmell © 1950 SingspirationLtd